


Theirs

by OnyxStitches



Category: Mercy Thompson Series - Patricia Briggs
Genre: F/M, adam centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-30
Updated: 2015-07-30
Packaged: 2018-04-12 03:42:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4464137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnyxStitches/pseuds/OnyxStitches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A retrospective look at Adam’s desire for Mercy with emphasis on the werewolves dual natures. Set somewhere before Moon Called.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Theirs

The man started it. Or maybe the wolf. Honestly neither of them were ever fully sure who started it. One of them must of.

It was the man who remembered best when it had begun for him. The wolf lives in the here and now, but the man revels in the past. He drowns himself in it. In the possibilities of what might’ve beens and could haves.

It’s the man who remembers the clearest. He knows when it started for him. An unpleasant afternoon after a bad day spawned from a line of bad days. Christy had gone (and taken their child with her). She’d run, as the wolf had always knew she would, and the man had been aching since. The thoughts of the ‘monster’ implied by her goodby statement swirling with rage and loss. Just then the knocking on the door had been an unpleasant distraction from the man’s grief.

He hadn’t expected her to be there. Not with her cookies and her advice and her kindness. Not after he’d put her down and made it clear he was only tolerating her because she was harmless.

He’d devoured the cookies once the door had closed behind her.

The other plates and platters of sympathy (pity) food he had left out for his pack to devour. They weren’t making him feel better so they might as well brighten his packs day. This plate he kept to himself; as unwilling to share as he was to ponder the reason why this offering was different.

He tried not to think about the fact that her sweaty palms had rubbed her scent along the bottom of the plate (or what an amazing scent it was).

Maybe it was the wolf who started it actually. After receiving orders to watch (guard, protect) the strange coyote (woman; ripe and sweet) from their leader. The Marrok had brushed it off as concern over a former stray, but the wolf had known. She was as much their leaders cub as the white-wolf healer or the red-brown assassin was. In a strange roundabout that made her pack (his).

A good Alpha protected what was his. Even when that thing was a troublesome coyote who shouldn’t have been running with wolves in the first place.

So maybe they'd never know who started it. That doesn’t matter. The wolf and the man were agreeing over this anyway. One way or another they had started to consider her _theirs_.

Then they had realised exactly how many of their pack would gladly kill her. How many of them wanted to rip, shred, and tear into the little coyote who they had promised to watch (guard, protect, covet, want).

The man (foolish, foolish man) had claimed her. Declared her his, _theirs_ , before their pack. It had kept her safe, but it had worn on both of them. They had claimed her but she wasn’t theirs.

They remained in this unpleasant limbo for years.

* * *

The desire wore on them differently.

The wolf is at heart a simple beast. He wanted her as a companion. To run together (on four legs or two) so long as they could. he wanted to curl up against her. To feel her fur brush his and know that she trusted him enough to rest by his side. He wanted to know that she trusted him to watch over and support her.

He would have been happy to hunt for her and lay his kill at her feet. To sing the glory of their bond to the moon. To bask in her presence and her scent while his kill filled her belly and his love filled her heart.

He would have liked to fill her belly with his cubs too, but he could live without it. He wanted her _regardless_ of what she could give him rather than because (a lesson the white wolf had never learned).

They wanted the same, but he wanted more too. It was a dream of his, a fantasy, to return to his bed with the coyote eager and waiting for him. The thought of just lying beside her basking in her scent was wonderful. Not that he would refuse her if she was ever lying wanting in his bed.

That had actually been a secret want of the man for a long time. The thought of her warm and wanting in his bed (or his office, over the kitchen counter, on the forest floor) had filled his quiet moments in the shower or his bed. She’d been a guilty extra in his fantasies from the first time he’d met her.

Sometimes when he just couldn’t stand his wife after a fight but had let her back into his bed anyways it was a woman with darker skin, hair, and eyes who filled his thoughts. It was a different woman’s name he growled against a soft neck when he came. Not that the man’s wife ever knew. **She** was only human and couldn’t hear that well.

The coyote could have heard that well.

Of course if it was the wily little coyote in his bed he probably wouldn’t have been imagining another woman’s face. Her scent, the sounds she’d make, and her body writhing beneath him (above him, against him, _for him_ ) would have been more than enough for him. The sound of her calling “Adam” would have wreaked him every time. The thought of it when he had a moment alone undid him every time.

* * *

In the end it didn’t really matter which of them started it. Both the man and the wolf were in agreement. By the end of it they would both have her for themselves.

Hunting coyote was difficult. As single misstep or too much outside influence could cause their hunt to end in failure. Samuel white-wolf had proven that when he’d sent her running. Only a truly cautious hunter would have the pleasure of her surrender.

And there would be rivals to fight off. Foolish humans drawn to her mistery, other wolves who saw what he saw, and a certain vampire who often ventured to close. Regardless, wolf or man, Adam was a fearsome (patient) hunter. He would get what he wanted eventually.

Mercy was such a fitting name. Both because he was caught in hers and because she would soon be under his. For now he only had to settle and wait. She would come to them.


End file.
